by Jones,Lesley
I was wearing jeans, a pair of Timberland boots, my Roxy snow jacket, and Liam’s scarf wrapped around my neck. I felt inadequate in every way.
“Okay, let’s give you some privacy here.” My brother clapped his hands together as he stepped towards me.
“No!” Liam stated loudly in my head, but it was only in my head.
In reality, he remained silent.
I stared at him, begging, willing him with everything I had in me to turn and look my way. To reach for my hand, to ask, “You doing okay, bub?” the way that he did.
I got nothing.
My brother started to head out of the room, but Will held his hand out to me in exactly the way I wanted Liam to do. I stared down at it for a few long moments before looking up at his face. He seemed to be wearing the same devastated look that I probably was. I wondered if he’d realised what was going on between Liam and me when he saw us holding hands and was feeling my pain. As I took his hand and let him lead me out of my brother’s house, I wondered if he would tell Luke.
Away from my hopes, my dreams, and my neck-kissing happily ever after.
“Where’s your car, Sunshine? We’ll go to yours for a bit.”
“I’ll drive,” Will jumped in, saving me.
Again.
“I’ll only have to come back here to get my car later anyway.”
Will steered me in the direction of his BMW, and Luke followed. I sat in the back and remained silent. The vibrations that had hummed happily through my body earlier were now causing me to shake. I was cold and I felt sick.
She wanted him back.
He promised he wouldn’t leave me.
He’ll go back to his wife, and I’ll end up just like her.
I snorted out loud.
I had been fucking a married man, I was just like her.
And I’d end up just like her.
Unwanted.
Alone.
“Sunshine?”
My brother’s voice cut into my erratic thoughts.
“How’d you get to my house?”
Adrenalin was coursing through my veins, putting my brain on alert and making it quick to respond.
“I got a lift with Liam.”
He turned in his seat to look at me, his eyebrows arched in question.
“With Del? Why?”
“He’s renting a flat across the road from me. I saw him there yesterday, and he asked if I would go shopping with him today and help him to pick some furniture.”
“You went shopping with him?”
“Yeah. Sasha’s away for the weekend, you were away. I had nothing better to do, so I said I’d help him. You know I like all that interior design and decorating stuff. I was happy to give him advice.”
“Sasha’s away? Where’d Sash go? Who with?”
“Just to see her parents in Devon.”
“Oh. On her own?”
“No, Luke, she took the homeless bloke who sits outside the station playing the violin with her, thought he needed a break and Devon needed some culture. Yes, on her own.”
“All right, no need to be a bitch about it.”
“Well, if you wanna know the ins and outs of Sasha’s weekend, I suggest you ask her yourself.”
“I will.”
“Good.”
He turned back to face the front, but a few seconds later, he turned to face me again.
“And his new flat is opposite yours?”
I gave an emphatic, “Yes!” and then raised my shoulders in a shrug and let out a huff. My brother was so suspicious, but I replied as nonchalantly as I could, acting as though I was just fed up with his questioning.
So what?
Liam had a flat opposite my house.
It was coincidence, right?
It didn’t matter anyway. He’d be leaving soon.
Going back to her.
Leaving me behind.
Leaving me exactly the same way everyone else did.
***
When we got back to my house Sasha was home. She was making her way down the stairs wearing nothing but a Specials band T-shirt and a pair of boy leg knickers. Her hair was wrapped in a towel. Her big brown eyes were wide when she saw the three of us coming through the front door. She looked over Will’s shoulder, probably to see if Liam was with us, and then her eyes darted back to mine. I shook my head in a very subtle movement. I was so focused on Sash that I walked straight into the back of my brother, who was apparently also focused on Sash.
He gave a salacious whistle, and she self-consciously pulled her T-shirt down to cover herself. I didn’t know why she bothered. The boys had seen her in less plenty of times. We’d had holidays together. Spent hours on beaches and around pools wearing very little. We’d shared beds in the past, all four of us on occasion when we’d been to parties and whomever the designated driver was had ended up drinking. I punched him anyway for making my friend feel uncomfortable.
Stepping around my brother, I left him rubbing his arm and staring at Sasha and headed for the kitchen. I pulled a bottle of vodka from the freezer and cranberry from the fridge. I didn’t ask if anyone else wanted one, I poured more than a double shot into a glass I’d quarter filled with crushed ice, topped it up with cranberry, and drank the lot down.
I didn’t want to believe that Liam had just done what he’d done.
I didn’t want it to be true.
I wanted to drink until it wasn’t true, or at least until I couldn’t remember it had happened.
I stared at the dishes in the sink. I thought about the reason they’d been left there.
How could he?
I felt like nothing. Inconsequential.
“Sarah?” I took a few moments to blink back my tears before turning around to face Will.
I didn’t want or need his sympathy right then, but I knew Will well enough to know that if he thought for a minute I was hurting, that was what I would get. That was just the type of bloke he was.
I schooled my features before facing him. “Sorry, Will. There’s beer in the other fridge if you want one.”
He shook his head.
“I’m good thanks. I’ve gotta drive back home later, plus we had a couple earlier and more than a skinfull last night.”
“What was the score? I’ve not seen any results.”
“We lost, 2-1.”
I nodded and smiled, wishing he would just fuck off and leave me alone. I didn’t wanna make small talk with Will. I didn’t actually know what I wanted.
I felt sick, empty, and shaky.
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to curl into a ball and sob or if I wanted to laugh maniacally.
Sasha finally appeared. “Pour us a wine, Sares. A large one. I need it after listening to my nan bang on all weekend about Reginald from the nursing home and how he gets her juices flowing.” She made sure Will wasn’t looking at her, and then added a silent, “You okay?”
I shook my head just as my brother came through the door with a beer in his hand.
“How old’s your nan now?”
“Seventy-nine,” Sasha told him.
Luke shuddered and pulled a face.
“I’m surprised she’s still got juices to flow at her age. I’d hate to think that my grandad is still banging my nan these days.”
“I don’t wanna think about my nan and the word juices together in the same sentence any time ever,” Will added.
I listened to their conversation about geriatric juices as I poured Sasha a wine and mixed myself another vodka, making it just a little bit stronger this time. I could already feel the effects of the first drink, I felt loose, disjointed, and still shaky.
“So what are you boys doing here tonight? I thought you’d be at home recovering from your trip to Manchester.”
I passed Sash her wine and joined her at the breakfast bar where she was sitting on a bar stool next to my brother. Will flipped on the kettle and started to make himself a cup of tea.
I drank my vodka and waited for someone to exp
lain to Sasha why the boys were at our place. I wasn’t going to. I couldn’t. My face and lips felt numb, my fingers felt tingly, and my chest felt like it had been stabbed with a sharp knife. With a serrated edge. Over and over and over again.
Stab.
Twist.
“Liam’s wife turned up from Australia, we thought it best to get out of their way and let them talk about whatever couples talk about when they’re trying to save their marriage.”
Stab.
Stab.
Twist.
Sasha knocked her glass of wine over. Will passed her a cloth and some kitchen roll to clear up the dark red mess with. It looked like blood. The blood that was pumping from my chest with every beat of my heart and stab and twist of that serrated edge knife.
I passed her the bottle of cab without her asking. I already knew she would want a top up after what Luke just told her. She’d need a drink as much as I did.
I drank my vodka and refused to make eye contact with Sasha.
“Liam has a wife?” she asked.
“Yeah, the marriage didn’t last long. They both fucked around on each other and then he caught her in bed with a business associate of his in their own home. He left her, and as far as I knew, they hadn’t seen each other for a couple of years, but according to her, they were trying to work things out before he left to come here,” Luke explained.
I struggled to hold back a sob.
He lied.
He lied to me.
I felt hot.
I wanted to cry.
I wanted to scream.
I wanted to fly.
I wanted to be somebody else, somewhere else.
“I can’t see that myself. He was adamant that it was over when I spoke to him at your party. The only reason he hadn’t pushed the divorce through sooner was because of the trouble it would cause between their families because the businesses had merged.”
I stared down at my finger as it traced a pattern over the breakfast bar we sat at while listening to Will.
I wasn’t sure if what he was saying was the truth or if he was just repeating what Liam had claimed, to try to make me feel better.
I didn’t really care either way.
It was done.
We were done.
Liam had lied.
He’d lied, and he would leave me.
Just like my dad. Just like my mum. Nobody stayed, because I wasn’t easy to love.
“You okay, Sunshine?” Luke asked from beside me. “You’re very quiet tonight.”
“I’ve got the beginnings of a migraine actually. I think I’m gonna go jump in the bath and then have an early night.”
I stood up. The room spun. I blamed it on the migraine causing black spots to dance in front of my eyes. I said goodnight and gave cuddles to everyone.
“We need to talk,” Will whispered in my ear.
“I’ll be up as soon as they’ve gone.” Sasha gave me a squeeze as she spoke.
I couldn’t be bothered to have a bath. I took off my clothes, pulled on a pair of pyjamas, and climbed into bed.
Why didn’t he choose me?
Just for once.
Why didn’t someone, anyone, just choose me?
I cried. I cried so hard my head, chest, and throat ached.
I cried until I fell asleep.
“Why are you here?” I asked Olivia again.
I’d let Luke and Will get Sarah out of the way. I felt sick to my stomach for not saying anything to Sarah before she left, but I couldn’t let Liv know that there was something going on between us. I was hoping for an amicable dissolution of our business partnership, along with a quick and easy divorce. If Liv knew I was happy and was planning to settle down with Sarah, that would never happen. It was something I couldn’t risk. My dad’s health wouldn’t take it if things got messy, and I didn’t want Sarah having to put up with me going through a messy, drawn-out divorce.
Our family’s names and business dealings weren’t known worldwide but they were newsworthy in Australia. Our wedding had been covered by Australian Vogue and there’d been rumours about our split in the tabloids. I’d threatened, via my lawyers, to expose Olivia’s affair with Sebastian Markham and to confess my heartbreak over catching them in bed together to anyone that would listen if Liv didn’t agree to a straight split down the middle of our assets. I wasn’t heartbroken. I was relieved. We married for all the wrong reasons, and I was glad to be out of it.
I would admit that my ego took a bit of a bashing when I found out she was fucking someone I did business with on a regular basis, but I was even more pissed off that she brought him to our home and fucked him in our bed. Whatever my misdemeanours might have been, I respected her enough to be discreet. I never slept with anyone that we knew mutually, I always took them to a hotel, and I never saw them again, at least not to fuck.
“Like I said, we need to talk.”
“You couldn’t have called or emailed?”
“You don’t reply to my emails, Liam, and I’ve only just got your new phone number. I’ve called the old Australian one numerous times, I had hoped that your calls were being diverted, and I’d reach you eventually, but apparently not.”
I did have my calls diverted to my new phone, but I wasn’t gonna admit that I’d deliberately ignored her attempts to contact me. Something I was regretting.
“You could’ve contacted Lennard. He would’ve passed on your message.”
She looked down at the tiled floor and wrapped her arms around her waist.
“This is personal. I didn’t want to involve Lennard.”
She finally looked up and met my gaze, her head was slightly tilted back as she struck her usual superior stance and looked down her nose at me. It was the way she looked at most people she came across in life.
Olivia had always had a high opinion of herself and her standing in society. Her goals were wide and her ambitions high, which were things that I would generally admire in a person. The problem I had with Liv, though, was that she didn’t care who she hurt to reach them. She wanted me because I was the best thing available in our small Aussie beach town, and she didn’t want anyone else to have me.
Next to hers, my family were the wealthiest and the most well-known. That was all that really mattered to Liv.
Image. Pretence.
We stared at each other in silence for a few moments. I had no clue what she was playing at by turning up here, we’d said all that needed to be said before I’d left Sydney. We’d been done two years ago and nothing had changed my mind on that score.
I wanted her to say what she had to say, and then I wanted her to fuck off out of my life once and for all.
I wanted to go and find Sarah. I wanted to sit down with Luke and explain that I was in love with his little sister and wanted to move on with my life. A life that Olivia would play no part in.
“I’m pregnant. It’s yours.”
The floor, the world, my entire fucking life fell away from beneath me. I reached out and steadied myself on the kitchen worktop.
“We used a condom. Both times, we used a condom. You’ve got an implant too. No. No fucking way are you pregnant.”
She reached for the large black handbag that was sitting at her feet on the floor and pulled out a couple of pieces of paper to hand to me.
One was just a print off of a hospital pregnancy test result, the other was a letter on headed paper from an obstetrician, and both had Olivia’s name on them. Both were dated last Thursday. Both confirmed that she was pregnant.
“No, Liv. I’m not having it. You might be pregnant, but there’s no fucking way that it’s mine. We were careful. We’ve always been careful. You’ve got an implant, we used a fucking condom!”
“My implant expired over a year ago and condoms are not one hundred percent full proof. Accidents happen and an accident has happened to us.”
No.
I could hardly catch my breath.
I’d just spent the most amazing twenty-fou
r hours of my life with Sarah.
I was the happiest I’d been in years.
This! This wasn’t happening.
“I don’t care about any of that shit. It’s not mine. I don’t believe you.”
They were just words. Words that I was using to try to convince myself, her, anyone that would listen that it wasn’t true. The baby wasn’t mine. She wasn’t even pregnant.
I suddenly felt so tired. I wanted to go back to my flat. I wanted to go back to my flat and find Sarah waiting there for me in our bed.
“Fair enough.” Olivia interrupted my thoughts. “You don’t have to care and you don’t have to believe me.”
“Then why the fuck are you here?”
There would be more to this. I knew her and how her brain worked. She wouldn’t have flown twelve thousand kilometres just to drop that bomb and leave.
She flicked her dark hair over her shoulders, and my stomach rolled. She was so different from Sarah, who was relatively short, curvy, and gorgeous. Sarah’s skin was like porcelain, with just a smattering of tiny freckles on her cute little nose and her shoulders. Her dress sense swung from total vamp to tomboy, and I fucking loved it. I loved her. I should’ve stopped her. I should’ve told Luke what was going on between us and confessed everything before Olivia had even had chance to speak, but I didn’t. I stood there and did nothing. I simply stood by and watched from my peripheral as Will held out his hand to her. Fucking Will. He held out his hand and she took it. She took it because I stood there and did nothing, fuck all. I didn’t even look at her. I didn’t even watch her leave.
I had just kept my eyes on Olivia, who was nothing like Sarah and not what I wanted. Olivia was tall, slim, and dark. Everything about her appearance was groomed and polished. Olivia would never have let her hair get wet unless she knew her hairdresser was on hand to dry it for her. Olivia would never have gone shopping with me today, she would’ve sent her interior designer out with her personal shopper and had the goods delivered. Olivia most definitely wouldn’t be caught dunking her Hob Nob into her tea. Fuck, Olivia probably didn’t even know what a Hob Nob fucking was.
“I’m here because I thought it only right and proper to tell you in person that you’re going to be a father, if that’s what you want.”
